November 2
I have just come back from another round trip to the People’s Gallery in the Waterloo Artstore. I took ‘The Moody Monk’ and ‘The Sunbeam Child’ back home and, for a bit of creative variety, this time entered a series of 4 photographs on canvas for the exhibition.
Three of these photographs were taken right here, at Lake Ontario. The one on the bottom right comes from Bermuda, where I was privileged to live for a couple of years. The story behind the two moon photographs can be found on my website, on the ‘Photoshop-Gallery’ page.
‘Mirage on Lake Ontario’
The ‘Mirage on Lake Ontario’ image (top left) was taken at the Waterfront in Burlington, at the end of an August afternoon. There was rain at the horizon and it created a non-existing coastline that was visible to the naked eye. A real mirage. The water was a bit restless and this made for a perfect scene to drag my camera from left to right during the exposure. This can result in a really soft, mesmerizing scene with plenty of colour hues.
‘Goddess of the Sea’
The bottom right image was taken on the island of Bermuda, at a beach that used to belong to a resort named Ariel Sands. Actor Michael Douglas, part of whose family comes from the gorgeous Atlantic Archipelago of islands, has been trying for years to resurrect and re-open the statue. But for now, the copper statue of Ariel, the Goddess of the sea, stands there alone overseeing the still unfortunate dilapidated property.
Ariel has been there for decennia, proudly staying upright in more than one cyclone and several rough circumstances. It stands about 30 yards from the beach and it is hard to get an interesting shot of it, unless there are stormy skies or impressively high seas. On this particular day, there was no sun. No dramatic cloud. And the kind of shaded light that often makes many people think: not good light to photograph. But nothing is further from the truth than that assumption. Overcast days produce very evenly spread light and when combined with a long exposure shot, can lead to interesting captures, like this one. I seem to remember the lens was open for close to a minute. The sea changes into a deeply coloured cotton-ball softness with different hues of green and what little light is hitting the immobile statue catches beautiful amber colours.